DOING HARD THINGS TOGETHER [F, 3-2-18]

CHRIST IN WINTER: Reflections on Faith & Life for the Years of Winter…

There are a lot of smart women where I live, especially in my house. Well, only one there, usually, but many others in the places we go.

One of those is Quaker folk singer Carrie Newcomer, who sings:

Here we stand breathless

And pressed in hard times

Hearts hung like laundry

On backyard clotheslines

Impossible just takes

A little more time [1]

You can do this hard thing

You can do this hard thing

It’s not easy I know

But I believe that it’s so

You can do this hard thing

But it is difficult to do hard things alone, so one of our pastors, May Beth Morgan, tells this story:

She grew up Roman Catholic, in a very Catholic school and neighborhood, in Chicago. In 2^nd grade, she was being prepared for first communion. The children were to fast from sweets during Lent as part of the preparation. Their nun teacher had each decorate a treat box [a shoe box] that was left at school. If anyone gave them a treat, a sweet, during Lent, they were not to eat it but to bring it to school and put it in their box. Then, come Easter, they could eat their treats.

That’s a very hard thing for a seven-year-old, to work on “delayed gratification,” especially if chocolate bunnies are involved. But, Mary Beth observed, that was why they all had their boxes together at school. It is easier to do hard things if we do them together.

JRMcF

johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com

1] The fourth of five verses of “You Can Do This Hard Thing,” in her album, The Beautiful Not Yet